Monthly Archives: December 2012

The Georgia Writing Assessment is January 23rd this year. That gives us just over two weeks after you return from the holidays to hone our ideas and writing style! We will hold a two-week writing workshop, focusing on sentence structure, ideas, and adding pizzaz to writing!

My school computer is functional again!! It’s amazing how much easier this makes keeping up with posts, etc.! Here’s my sneaky (not so sneaky) plan for helping you review this year. I’m assigning a different study strategy and “homework” piece each night to try to help you space out your studying during the week before the final exam. Each assignment will take between 10 and 40-minutes and should help you prepare for a different section of the language arts exam. Here’s what we’ve done so far.

DAY

CONTENT

STUDY STRATEGY

Monday

Verbals (Infinitives, Gerunds, Participles and their functions)

Complete practice problems– This works in math, too.

Tuesday

Skill: Summarizing

Complete a summary of what you read. This works in social studies and science, too. If you can summarize key points, you can be pretty sure you understand a concept.

Predict what essay questions the teacher might include on the exam and answer them! Even if the essay question doesn’t appear on the test, odds are the concepts will be addressed in a multiple-choice or short answer question!

So, congratulations to us for reading, but ladies and gents, it’s time to kick it up a notch! Starting at the end of January/beginning of February, we’re going to read substantial books that might be considered classics! Get ready. This kind of deep reading will really help prepare you for high school, it will have an impact on your writing, and it will challenge you to think deeply. We’re also refocusing on vocabulary, so dig out those cards!

What’s up before the holidays? We’re wrapping up our “non-fiction” text, Chasing Lincoln’s Killer (Parents, this is a good read for any age, but the author actually adapted it from a novel called Manhunt he wrote for adults. If you’re looking for an interesting historical read, read along with your student.

Finals are coming up in a few weeks, so brush up on those phrases. Schedule your help-session now, so you don’t have to be stressed the last few days before finals. A good habit is to study for 10-minutes per class per night–no matter if you think “you have homework” or not.

STUDY EXTRA: This guy knows what he’s talking about. Check out his video about how to improve study skills.